MySpace Music is excited to announce the exclusive unveiling of the first single from the highly anticipated Almost Alice soundtrack. Presently, users can stream the song “Follow Me Down” from 3OH!3 via the social networking site’s music channel. In the coming weeks, MySpace Music will continue to premiere songs from the soundtrack as well as hosting the full album stream leading up to the film’s release.

The upcoming MySpace Music premieres are as follows: Avril Lavigne – “Alice” (Feb. 4), All Time Low – “Painting Flowers” (Feb. 19), Almost Alice complete album stream (Feb. 28). To listen to “Follow Me Down” from 3OH!3 visit: http://www.myspace.com/music.

Almost Alice boasts an eclectic array of recording artists with original songs based on some of the most charismatic characters in literary history, such as “In Transit” performed by Mark Hoppus and Pete Wentz. Other artists include The All-American Rejects, Shinedown, 3OH!3,  Franz Ferdinand and All Time Low.

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Never Shout Never will premiere their brand-new video, "I Love You 5," on MySpace on February 2nd, 2010. Never Shout Never, the brainchild of 18-year-old singer-songwriter and guitarist Christofer Drew, shot the video in his hometown of Joplin, MO, with a group of his friends.

"I Love You 5" is a track off the band's debut album What Is Love?, which was released this week by Loveway/Sire Records. MySpace recently chose Never Shout Never as a MySpace Introducing Artist for the first quarter of 2010.

In addition, Drew will perform live at the Mall of America in Bloomington, MN, on February 13th at 2:00 p.m. Admission to this event, which will take place in the mall's courtyard, is free and open to the public. After the live performance, the band will be signing copies of What Is Love? at the mall's Hot Topic retail store.

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With the power of the internet, you can produce a ropey dubstep track in your bedroom and get it heard across the continent just a few weeks later thanks to P2P networks. But do people make music for pleasure, or to become mega famous? With the rise of shows like X Factor, more people see the glamour.

You could get funny looks when asked if you’d consider just plodding along releasing records that you enjoy making. After all, if you’re not selling out arenas after five years, shouldn’t you give up? If you vaguely care, then of course not.

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A Palm Coast man was arrested after an online tiff on MySpace turned violent and spilled into real life -- and onto city streets.Dimy Simon, 21, faces a charge of simple battery after witnesses said he recognized and punched an unidentified 18-year-old Palm Coast man at an impromptu gathering outside Simon's house, according to a Flagler County Sheriff's Office report.

The two had been fighting on the social networking Web site and had never met face to face, the report states. About 8 p.m. on Jan. 15, sheriff's deputies responding to a disturbance spotted a group of juveniles at the corner of Brushwood and Brunswick lanes.

Witnesses said they were "hanging out" outside Simon's house with Simon, an acquaintance, when Simon recognized one of the teens as the person he'd been fighting with online. Simon started cursing and yelling and when the man tried to walk away, Simon punched him in the face, the report states.

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December data released by Nielsen examines year-over-year trends in unique visitor counts and time spent on social networking sites in the United States and around the world, including Facebook and Myspace.  US time spent on social networks increased faster than the average global increase of 82%, with the average US user spending 143% more time on social nets than last year.

Facebook, not surprisingly, was accountable for much of the increased social network usage in the US, with a 200% year-over-year increase in average time spent. A look at the traffic chart below shows just how rapidly Facebook has gained unique visitors. In December 2008, MySpace had slightly more unique visitors than Facebook, at just under 60 million, according to the Nielsen data. By December 2009, Facebook was well past 100 million US unique visitors, while MySpace lost users.

A trend chart from Compete.com tells the story more succinctly. December 2008 was MySpace’s last month as the leading social networking site in the US.Still, MySpace has more than 50 million users in the US, which makes it a Top 5 website in the US, according to Experian Hitwise data as of January 23, 2010.

Fifty million users means there is still a vibrant and loyal community on MySpace, while Facebook has brought a whole new audience to social networking – 30, 40 and 50 somethings.With the exception of Twitter, Facebook’s explosive growth has stolen thunder from smaller, more focused networks like Classmates and LinkedIn.

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In recent months, MySpace has struggled under pressure from the Facebook juggernaut. It's purchases of iLike and imeem we're designed to strengthen its position in music. More recently MySpace has been integrating Facebook Connect into its own platform.

The feature allows users to sign into MySpace using their Facebook ID. It's live on MySpace's Fan Video service and further integration is expected in the coming months. Some analysts believe that this is a sign that MySpace is ceding the social networking space to Facebook. But the move is also a smart affirmation that users want to spread their time across multiple platforms.

To bolster its own efforts, MySpace has hired social media marketer Sean Percival as director of content socialization. In the past, Percival helped brands and personalities maximize their exposure on the site. He also authored “MySpace Marketing: Creating A Social Network To Boom Your Business" and blogs about the LA technology community on Lalawag. 

SINGER Sade, the former Ocho Rios resident, has topped the online jazz charts with her single Soldier of Love, one day after its release. The song topped MySpace's jazz charts with over 55,000 plays a day after its January 12 release.

The video is the title single of her upcoming album to be released on February 8. Up to noon on Saturday, the growth in plays slowed and totalled 68,580. MySpace is a popular social networking site, and although the plays don't number in the millions, the chart comparatively shows that interest in the Nigerian-born songstress remains.

Soldier of Love (Epic Records) will be her first studio album since 2000's Lovers Rock but she also released a live album in 2002. All seven of Sade's albums have peaked in the Top 10 on the Billboard Top 200. Since the release of her debut album, Diamond Life in 1984 her worldwide sales have surpassed 50 million albums. Soldier of Love was recorded in England and produced by her band and long-time collaborator Mike Pela.

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Last month, MySpace finally completed its deal to acquire troubled music startup Imeem. Unfortunately for imeem fans, the bank shut the service down as soon as the deal was completed, redirecting them to a MySpace Music splash screen. MySpace was subsequently trashed by outraged users who wanted their playlists back. Today, they're getting what they asked for: MySpace has just sent out an Email to imeem users, informing them that they'll be able to restore their playlists using a new import tool. We've confirmed with MySpace that the feature is now live.

The process is simple: users enter their imeem Email address, hit "Import Playlists", and will find their imeem playlists restored under the "My Music" section of MySpace Music. The playlists will behave as normal MySpace playlists do, but will be labeled to indicate that they originated from imeem. The process should be seamless for most users, but there are a few caveats: MySpace won't be able to restore songs where there are differences between the imeem and MySpace music license catalogs. MySpace says this won't be an issue for most songs, but didn't have an exact percentage for how much of the catalogs overlap.

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MySpace music has topped the list  of Australian music sites by a massive margin according to the latest figures from Nielsen Market Intelligence, recording over 2 million more unique browsers than it's nearest competitor.

MySpace Music attracted 2.38 million unique browsers for the month of December, compared to the next highest competitor. in the music and radio category. MCM Entertainment's take40.com and dance music community inthemix.com.au rounded up the top three performers in the space.

MySpace Music launched in Australia in October last year, a joint venture between MySpace, EMI Music, Sony Music, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group. The service offers  the world’s largest free and legal streaming of music tracks.

National sales director, Australia and New Zealand, Andrew Cordwell said: “The immediate impact of MySpace Music emphasises the demand for content driven social media within the 13-30 age bracket.  As the trend for brands to align  with music continues to gain momentum, MySpace Music is offering unique opportunities for advertisers to develop strategies around the interests of their target audiences.”  

MySpace Music has leapfrogged its nearest competitor, two months after the free music streaming service launched, attracting almost 2.4 million unique browsers during December. According to Nielsen Market Intelligence figures it toppled MCM Entertainment’s take40.com site which had attracted 358,330 unique browsers during November, while MCM’s other music streaming site thehothits.com attracted 183,250.

December figures revealed that MySpace Music had not only hit the top ten, but also led the pack by a susbstantial margin of 2.38 million, ahead of take40.com’s 351,399 unique browsers. MySpace Music is a joint venture between MySpace, EMI Music, Sony Music, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group. It claims to provide the world’s largest catalogue of on-demand streaming music tracks and full albums to MySpace users for free.

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